Lindsay #2
I want him to do it again. I want him so bad it hurts.
Me: How did you get my number?
Matteo: Stop it, Princess. You know I can get anything I want.
The heat crawling up my neck tells me he isn’t just talking about my number.
Me: What do you want?
Matteo: Just checking in. Making sure you’re not being a bad girl without me.
My insides heat and I can just hear the suggestive tone in the text.
I’m about to reply and tell him that I’ll be a bad girl for him all he wants if he stops being stupid and fucks me hard enough to forget my own name. But then my phone rings and my arousal practically disappears.
It’s my father’s secretary. My lips turn up in a frown. The call from her is a surprise—my father usually contacts me directly.
I answer the call on the third ring. “Hello.”
Kim’s voice fills my ear, dangling on the edge of panic.
“Ms. Beaumont. It’s an emergency,” she states. “Your father has been shot.”
The phone nearly slides out of my hand. And I feel my world start to collapse.
“What? What do you mean shot?” I jump to my feet. “Where is he? H-how is he?”
“He’s alive,” she hurriedly replies. “We’re at St. Gabriel’s hospital. He’s currently in surgery.”
“Oh god. I’m on my way.”
I grab my purse and my coat absentmindedly, still gripping the phone in my hand. Rachel’s eyes grow as wide as saucers when I inform her I have to leave due to a family emergency. I’m in a daze, barely computing my surroundings.
My only thought is my father and our last interaction. I haven’t spoken to him in weeks. I hear Rachel call for me. Someone else wondering where I’m off to in such a rush. I ignore them all as I head down to the parking lot and into my car.
After a deep breath, I manage to start the car with shaky hands. How I make it to the hospital in one piece is a mystery. But as soon as I do, blind panic kicks in once again and I’m rushing through the front door.
“My father. Where’s my father?” I ask the nurse at the front desk.
She must be used to seeing frazzled family members because she doesn’t even blink.
“Who’s your father, miss?” she asks gently.
“Mayor Beaumont. He was brought here a while ago. He’s currently in surgery.”
She quickly directs me to the fourth floor where I find Kim pacing the length of the waiting room in front of the theatre.
The tall, brunette woman is usually the perfect picture of stoic professionalism.
Right now, there’s a crumpled expression on her face and the front of the white suit she has on has blood splattered all over it.
My father’s blood.
My feet stumble as I approach her. She stands up straight when she notices me.
“I’m so sorry, Ms. Beaumont. He’s still in surgery and I have no idea what’s going on,” she tells me.
I inhale deeply before speaking. “What happened?”
“After spending the night in the office yesterday, we were headed to your home so he could rest. The driver pulled up in front of the fountain. I got out of the car first and as soon as he climbed out, there was a gunshot. Your father went down, clutching his chest. I don’t know where it came from but some of the security guards took off in the direction of the shot.
We got him to the hospital as fast as we could. ”
“Okay.” I nod. “You should go and get changed. I’ll stay here. How long did the doctor say the surgery will take?”
“It should be over in about an hour.”
She leaves and then it’s just me, my eyes swimming with tears that I refuse to let fall. One of my biggest fears is losing my father. After my mom died, I’ve lived with the terror of my only remaining parent passing on as well.
I need him. Despite how I’ve acted this past year, I need him to survive this.
And even bigger than the fear rolling through me is the thought that this is all my fault. I may have put him in danger. If I’m the reason my father dies, I’ll never forgive myself.
I’ve barely been able to forgive myself for my mother.
I sink into one of the waiting room chairs, pressing my palms flat against my knees. The corridor is quiet up here. A different kind of quiet from the lobby—something heavier, watchful. I stare at the closed theatre doors and try to breathe.
My phone buzzes.
I almost don’t look. Then I do.
It’s not Matteo. It’s a number I don’t recognize, but the text makes my stomach drop.
Unknown: You should know better, Prosecutor. Consider this a warning. Drop the case—or the next bullet won’t miss.
The phone trembles in my hand. I read the message again. Then again.
I’m still staring at it when a different kind of sound breaks through the corridor. Not a monitor. Not footsteps. Something rawer than that.
A woman’s voice, low and strained, coming from somewhere around the corner.
I’m on my feet before I fully decide to be. I follow the sound, turning down the adjacent hallway—and stop.
Salvatore Vitale is standing at the nurses’ station, one large hand braced against the counter, looking like a man who has misplaced the single most important thing he’s ever owned.
Behind him, two of his men hover uselessly.
One of the nurses is speaking to him quickly, calmly, in the practiced tone of someone managing chaos for a living.
The sound I heard wasn’t a voice.
It was Valentina. Through a closed door at the end of the hall, muffled and unmistakable.
Something cold moves through me.
“Salvatore.”
He turns at my voice. Whatever he was expecting to see around that corner, it wasn’t me. A beat passes where we simply look at each other—prosecutor and Don, connected only by the woman we both love more than we’re comfortable admitting.
“Lindsay.” His voice is rough. “Why are you here?”
“My father.” I gesture vaguely toward the fourth floor waiting room. “He was shot this morning. He’s in surgery.” I nod toward the closed door. “Is that Valentina?”